Daniel Moore’s Definitive Guide to Failure-Free Living at Drayton Arms Theatre 3 – 7 February 2026

‘Barnacles on a Whale!’ ★★★★

Entering the black box performance space of The Drayton Arms Theatre, curated by Audrey Thayer, I took my seat next to a speaker playing compressionistic sound design whilst the lead performer and writer, Matthew Edgar (Wet Feet), completes menial bedroom tasks in all corners of the floor. Making use of the end-on square space, centre stage a button lights up red every few moments, needing to be pushed at the order of an overhead automated message. This dystopian setting is akin to many of its revisionist contemporaries, namely Black Mirror and Inside No 9, however the narrative never feels kitsch, and the ending earned. Based around the abstract of Malcolm Gladwell’s book ’10,000 Hours,’ our protagonist, Daniel Moore, has almost completed twenty-thousand hours of failure free living. The key question asked in this piece is what happens when we turn our existence into a gamification, whom are we doing it for, and how does it make us relate each other? Making everything a non-cooperative competition where an abstract score is kept by empty interfaces leading to server farms isolates us from our fellow people, which is probably why this is a one person production.

The direction of Harry Daisley (All is Pink in West Berkshire County) keeps the action sprightly and moving, with a minimal set that is transformed through its technical elements. The lead performance is strong, with a protagonist who starts the piece in a negatively heightened state of mind, and only further deteriorates from there. Although the main narrative within the fictional present is a lot more interesting than the flashbacks, the central metaphor of a grey whale collecting barnacles, therefore becoming less streamlined, is a great vessel to carry the themes of this piece. Daniel Moore may have no one slowing him down, but the process of achieving his goals isn’t nearly as enjoyable.

Dates - February 3rd - 7th

Performer - Matthew Edgar

Directed by Harry Daisley

Box Office - https://www.thedraytonarmstheatre.co.uk/failure-free-living-2